Just recently I was speaking with someone about my novel, and the subject of different points of view (or POVs, as someone more familiar with the jargon may put it) came up. And in the moment, I had to remember that not everyone went to school to study literature and writing like I did. So, I figured the time had come to give a brief overview of the different points of view writers use, and why they tend to use them.
At first glance, there are three basic POVs.
First Person is the POV we typically use when we’re telling stories about our own lives: “I went to the store,” “I put the phone down,” etc. Basically, it occurs when we are experiencing the events of the story through the mind of the main character. Writers tend to use the first person point of view in fiction when they want their audience to connect with their MC on a deeper level. Literally being inside their head makes us more privy to their thoughts, their fears, and just the ways they think in general. It can also help limit the audience’s perspective as the plot unfolds: if there’s anything the main character doesn’t know, the audience doesn’t know it, either.
Second Person is far less common in novels (from my experience, at least), but more prevalent in shorter literature. The best way to describe second person is that you are in a “choose your own adventure” story. The main character is you, and the writing expresses it as such: “you walk through the door,” “you think this isn’t a good idea,” etc. To be frank, this is the kind of POV that only highly acclaimed literary artists can experiment with and pull off without being chastised. It’s weird in that it works to bring your reader directly into the story, but also seems to distance them from the events, as if they’re walking through a dream. From my (granted, limited) experience with stories in second person, this makes it more likely to up the tension in some situations—because your reader is part of the story, but they have no control of what they’re going to do next, or how they are going to react.
Third Person is one of the more common POVs I’ve seen, particularly in classic literature. It’s the perspective where many of the pronouns come into play at once, because the narrator is an often unnamed (but occasionally named, in some works of fiction) spectator who is watching the story unfold from the outside. For instance, the narration may state that “he/she/they/the flesh-eating monster” did something. In this case, the reader can be privy to a number of things, happening to a number of characters, within the same story.
However, this is where things begin to get a little more complicated. And while we can probably argue that the following can occasionally be applied to first and second person, it is more commonly experienced through the third person POV:
Omniscient perspective means the narrator is basically a god. They know all, they see all. They are aware that Kortney is thinking of reaching for that last cream puff at the exact same time that Caleb is thinking of reaching for it as well. And that, just outside the cabin, the flesh-eating monster is sensing their presence.
Limited perspective is like the “first person” of third person POV—i.e., the narrator can only hear the thoughts and experience the feelings of one (or sometimes two) characters. For instance, we may know that Kortney just heard a sound coming from outside of the cabin and that it worries her, but we are unsure if Caleb heard it as well—unless he says something or makes some kind of reaction. And, of course, we remain unaware of what’s lurking outside.
Objective perspective is when the narrator has no special powers of perception. They are an average Joe watching the story unfold as if they are watching a movie on the TV and can only make a judgement about what the characters are feeling and/or thinking by what they say and do. For instance, Kortney’s eyes widen, and Caleb’s brow furrows as he looks at her. We don’t know for sure that Kortney is feeling scared, and that Caleb is confused as to why she is scared, but we can easily assume it.
And then there’s the outlandish Fourth Person POV: a fairly uncommon perspective in writing I am assuming, as I am just learning about it today. There seems to be some debate on whether it’s a collective perspective (we, us, etc.), or it’s a narration through the use of indefinite pronouns (oneself, somebody, anybody, etc.). I have no idea how one could use this perspective through an entire story without another someone wanting to beat one over the head with one’s frying pan…
Anyway, those are the basic points of view used in literature with a few of their variations thrown in.
Night Owls, what is your favorite POV to read in/write in, and why?
